The convergence of European vocational education and training (VET) systems within an EU framework started gradually in the second half of the 20th century and accelerated in the 90s and early 2000s with the launch of mobility and research transnational programmes and the establishment of EQF (2008), ECVET (2009), EQAVET (2009), and the Recommendation on the validation of non-formal and informal learning (2012).
The main outcomes of this process can be listed as follows:
The comparative research conducted for ESSA has identified some common trends in the case study countries (DE, ES, IT, PL, UK) and obtained some relevant insights in relation to skills gaps, systems’ strengths and shortcomings, to inform cooperation between industry and VET providers.
In this Deliverable, ESSA Project WP3 addresses the near future changes in the professional skills requirements of the steel industry facing Industry 4.0 and provides insights and hints from varied perspectives to deal with the current skills requirements and as well as the future skills requirements urging with digitalization. It offers concrete examples to demonstrate how the steel company departments (particularly Human Resources (HR) Department), curricula developers, qualification providers and other stakeholders can use the generated profiles for job profile definitions during the assessment, career development and curriculum design, in order to support an organisational change process including digital transformation.
Additionally, this work package offers a brief guidance on how to connect the profile
ESSA D3.1 Database of professional profiles - FINAL VERSION (December 2022)
A detailed video about how to use the database can be found in this link:
https://www.loom.com/share/9b09ca48e6c94b0a9a27789883fca588
Brief Description:
In addition to the report on the piloting and sustainable implementation of the Blueprint frame-work, strategies, tools and measures (see Deliverable D6.2; Schröder et al., 2021) this deliv-erable will focus on the implementation of the ESSA governance structure, incl. political and funding support, connectivity between EU and the national/regional level as a basis for the exploitation plan (Deliverable D6.3). ESSA will be implemented with a social innovation pro-cess by the industry and for the industry integrating all the relevant and willing stakeholders on the European, national and regional level.
This report focuses on VET essential characteristics and regulation in five countries selected from among the ESSA partnership: Germany, Italy, Poland, Spain, UK.
This deliverable (D4.1) is one of the five outcomes of WP4 – VET Requirements and Regula-tions/National VET Systems (relevant requirements and regulations for the Blueprint), which is aligned with, and a continuation of, the research carried out in WP2 - Technological and Economic Development and Foresight, and WP3 - (Company) Skills Requirements and Fore-sight (Skills, Knowledge, Competences; Work 4.0).
The WP4 deliverables are devised as complementary to one another and aim to offer wide-angle pictures of different aspects of the relationship between industry and vocational education and training. Specifically, this report intends to offer a picture of regulatory aspects and essen-tial characteristics of the selected countries’ VET systems, with a special focus on VET provision related to the Steel Industry.
The following report focuses on cross-European VET frameworks and standards for sector skills recognition. It is one of the five outcomes of WP4 – VET Requirements and Regula-tions/National VET Systems (relevant requirements and regulations for the Blueprint) and is intended as complementary to the other deliverables produced under this work package.
This report provides an overview of the most relevant tools and frameworks devised and im-plemented at the EU level to support the transparency and transferability of qualifications and competencies among the EU countries.
This report serves both as a rationalisation of and a guide to the ESSA Sector Skills Matrix (D.4.4).
The Sector Skills Matrix (SSM) is a systematic attempt to identify steel-sector relevant occupational qualification programmes in five European countries with a significant steel industry. The Matrix’s main function is to provide an assessment of each occupational qualification programme in terms of adequacy of current transversal skills provision. Additionally, by taking ESSA research on future skill needs in the steel sector into account, the Matrix is also able to provide an assessment of current and future transversal skills gaps for each qualification programme. In doing so, the Matrix is a valu-able tool that can help to structure future efforts to improve transversal skills provision, which are widely seen as critical in the context of Industry 4.0 and digitalisation.
The Sector Skills Matrix (D4.4) that is being developed within WP4 intends to offer industry stakeholders a tool for capturing (and comparing) information about steel-relevant qualifications and relative transversal skills pro-vision across different countries (starting with the ESSA five case study countries).
This report aims to offer a brief and clear overview of the state of play of vocational education and training in the ESSA case study countries, as well as more generalisable insights and recommendations on how to effectively navigate the opportunities offered by the different VET systems (exem-plified by the 5 case study countries) and overcome their limitations.
The potential equivalence between ESCO and the titles in the STEEL SECTOR also enabled us to generate an automated database for the description of the European Steel Sector Professional Role Profiles taking the ESCO description of occupations as the main data source. Using the ESCO database for Occupations, DEUSTO University has developed a software that will allow automating the description of the different profiles of the STEEL SECTOR.
The result of this first description of the profiles are continuously being validated and refined through the knowledge of the Steel Sector industrial partners that are collaborating on the WP3. The aim of this step was to create a common database of professional profiles related with steel sector, which is interactive for continuous updating. It was accomplished through data integration and automation processes. The database is delivered under the name of “Deliverable 3.1 Database of the Professional Profiles”
In this Deliverable, WP3 addresses the near future changes in the professional skills requirements of the steel industry facing Industry 4.0 and provides insights and hints from varied perspectives to deal with the current skills requirements and as well as the future skills requirements urging with digitalization. It offers concrete examples to demonstrate how the steel company departments (particularly Human Resources (HR) Department), curricula developers, qualification providers and other stakeholders can use the generated profiles for job profile definitions during the assessment, career development and curriculum design, in order to support an organisational change process including digital transformation.
The deliverable "Piloting and Implementing the Blueprint" explores the activities planned as part of the Blueprint implementation. The aim is to establish a stable and reliable governance and coordination of activities via the industry's existing structures, and to do so on the Euro-pean, national and regional level. It is a proposal, that has to be discussed with the main actors of the European Steel Industry community.
The piloting and implementation process is based on the strategy 'Prototype of the Blueprint New Skills Agenda Steel' and on the already huge and excellent partnership alliance of ESSA (40 partners comprising companies, training providers, European and national steel associa-tions and social partner, and research institutions). The main elements of ESSA are:
The European Steel Technology and Skills Foresight Observatory (ESSA ETF), including the regular (annual or bi-annual) European Steel Technology and Skills Foresight Panel (ESSA ETP) (demand side)
The Online Training Ecosystem "steelHub" (ESSA OTS) and Regional Training Ecosystems (ESSA RTS) (supply side).
Digitalization can be considered the main driver that directly impacts on the advanced manufacturing and transversally affects all the others. As consequence, it can be said that the technological transformation in the European Industry is driven by digitalization, aiming mainly to increase the production efficiency and sustainability in order to reduce the industrial environmental impact. The digital transformation of the steel production mainly concerns the application of the related technologies on the steel production processes, where the ongoing technological developments are focused on two fields: 1) advanced tools for the optimization of the whole production chain and 2) specific technologies for low-carbon production.
This deliverable is the updated version the first one released on July 2019 and integrated with the survey results on November 2019.
Differently from the first version of the deliverable, the survey was not carried out because part of this survey will be integrated to form a regular (annual or bi-annual) foresight survey: ESSA European Steel Technology and Skills Foresight Panel (ESSA ETP). It includes not only tech-nological aspects, but also questions from other surveys carried out in other WPs of the project and related to industry steel skills requirements (WP3) and VET (Vocational Education and Training) systems anticipation and support of future skills (WP4). This panel will be a central part of the ESSA Foresight Observatory (ESSA ETF), under construction.
This report summarises the progress of the European Steel Skills Alliance and Agenda (ESSA) and its implementation strategies based on the results of its first cycle:
Phase 1: Identifying skills requirements and basics for establishing the Blueprint (WP 2, 3, and 4), first contours of the Blueprint (WP5)
Phase 2: Reflecting the first research results and network development with policy, social partner, European and national representatives (WP6, 7)
Phase 3: Upgrade of the research results of phase 1 (WP 2, 3, 4), implementing a prototype of the European Steel Skills Agenda and strategy (WP5).
This report summarises the foreseen Training Framework based on the progress of the European Steel Skills Alliance and Agenda (ESSA) and its implementation strategies of its first cycle:
• Phase 1: Identifying skills requirements and foundations for establishing the Blueprint (WP 2, 3, and 4), first contours of the Blueprint (WP5)
• Phase 2: Reflecting the first research results and network development with policy, social part-ner, European and national representatives (WP6, 7)
• Phase 3: Upgrade of the research results of phase 1 (WP 2, 3, 4), implementing a Blueprint Pro-totype of the European Steel Skills Agenda and strategy (WP5).